1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to nano-particles and more particularly to nano-particles surrounded by a gel for fluid separation and/or purification applications.
2. Description of Related Art
Over the last two decades immense progress has been made in the synthesis of nano-materials. These materials have morphological features on the nano-scale which lead to special chemical and physical properties. A sub-classification of nano-materials is nano-particles which are minute objects that function as wholes units. Nano-particles are generally classified according to sizes ranging from 1-2500 nanometers. These materials have been structurally engineered and are characterized by tremendously high surface areas' (m2/gram) and often have tremendously high pore volume (ml/ml). Particle size (length and width), pore size, and directionality can be manipulated through novel synthetic methods. Specific chemical and physical properties can be structurally integrated through choice of elemental substituent's and dimensional features. The most well known among these materials are buckyballs, single and double walled carbon nano-tubes, silicon and silicon dioxide nano-wires. Several others exist that are of non-uniform shape or have extremely small particle size on the order of nanometers. More extensive are the highly porous inorganic analogues such as nickel sponge, and a considerable variety of other inorganic metals and metal oxides.
Several potential applications of these materials exist across several industries. Immediate applications can be found in chemical, biological, pharmaceutical, semiconductor, energy and environmental fields for separation and purification of fluid materials. These range from crude separation of raw materials to final purification processes down to parts-per-trillion purity levels.
These may involve chemical recycling, energy storage, analyte separation in biological samples, high purity purification for semiconductor processes, water remediation, air pollution control, metal capture in the nuclear industry, removal of toxic materials for human safety, microbial contamination sensing and control, as well as controlled release drug delivery.
Practical application of these materials has found very limited use. Some of this may be attributed to a lack of availability. However, other problems exist such as small particle agglomeration and complete particle containment. Some carbon based materials have been granulated, pressed into blocks, or woven into fabrics. However, the rendering of these materials into a practical, useful form remains a significant challenge.
Particle sizes of carbon and silicon based materials can be as minute as 20-300 nanometers. Thus, containment of these materials in a functional form for fluid separation and purification applications is problematic. From the standpoint of material retention, it is imperative that particles not be released into the fluid stream. Moreover, key to the successful utilization of these nano-materials is exploitation of the materials' entire effective surface area. Here, it is key that fluid flow runs uniformly throughout the interior pores of the material as well as across the entire outer surface. Therefore, proper material packaging is essential. Functional considerations also need to be taken into account. Pressure drop across the entire materials packaging assembly must be kept to a minimum. In other instances, separations must be conducted in multiple steps and it may be necessary to position diverse nano-materials separately.
What is needed is an apparatus and method for providing small nano-particles that can be contained in a functional package for fluid separation and/or purification applications.